Congestion charges needed for reaching sustainable city goals in Klang Valley, says Nik Nazmi

The Star

The government must consider imposing congestion charges to achieve sustainable city goals in the Klang Valley, said Nik Nazmi Nik Ahmad.  The Natural Resources and Environmental Sustainability Minister said that during the launch of Prasarana's sustainability blueprint on Tuesday (Dec 19), adding that discussions had been held on the imposition of congestion charges after the completion of the MRT3 line.  WATCH MORE: https://thestartv.com/c/news SUBSCRIBE: https://cutt.ly/TheStar LIKE: https://fb.com/TheStarOnline

Transcript

00:00 Let's give a big round of applause.

00:02 Congratulations to Prasarana Malaysia Berhara.

00:06 Ladies and gentlemen, I know that for Prasarana, the challenge indeed is to convince Malaysians

00:14 that Malaysian public transport is something that is efficient and accessible.

00:20 Malaysians use public transport across the world, when they go not only to London but even to Singapore.

00:27 But the moment they step in Kuala Lumpur, there's this cynicism whether our public transport is good enough.

00:34 But really I believe the challenge lies in ourselves, in trying to change how we approach the way we live.

00:43 If we have a commitment towards sustainability, we know that our public transport is developing at a rapid pace.

00:51 And the next step will be the completion not only of LRP3 but also of MRP3, that we will have our own circle line.

01:00 And there has been long talks of even a congestion charge with the completion of an MRP3.

01:08 That is not my decision, but it is something that I think we have to consider

01:12 if we want to talk about a more sustainable city moving forward.

01:17 Maybe earlier you mentioned about congestion charge, maybe it's something that we can elaborate on.

01:22 Okay, no I'm saying that there was a proposal in the past, provided there's a few provisos there.

01:31 One is that our public transport has reached a certain level.

01:36 Secondly, I think the main focus has always been on MRP3.

01:41 MRP3 is the circle line that will complete the connection between the different rail lines that we have in the country.

01:49 So you don't have to go to the city centre to change trains, you can do it at the periphery.

01:55 That will help. But I think that is obviously another discussion that we need to have.

01:58 All that I'm saying is that we have to bear in mind that we need to change our habits.

02:04 So that is one of the things that's proposed. Nothing has been decided.

02:07 But I think the government, we have to make difficult decisions.

02:11 In the past one year, for example, when we were in charge of electricity,

02:17 we started the journey towards targeted subsidies for electricity tariffs.

02:21 And that has compelled many companies, after the complaints and whatnot,

02:25 to start installing solar panels and energy efficiency measures.

02:28 So maybe we need to look at that, or any other option to encourage.

02:32 So it has to be both carrot and stick to encourage the adoption of public transport.

02:37 [BLANK_AUDIO]

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